Shallow truth

On Friday my brother was in town so I met up with him and some friends for dinner and drinks at a pub on the Thames (Doggett's, it's my standard, oh you're here for one night pub because it has nice views, okay food and reasonable for Zone 1 prices, that's not the shallow truth I am here to present to you though). At about 9:30 we came back to our neighbourhood for a couple more drinks sans brother and on the bus back to Zone 2 my friend Paula told me (without prompting!) that my accent was 'different, softer' than my brother's.

I was so pleased that I was almost ashamed of myself.

That's right, it pleases me to no end to know that I no longer sound like where I come from. Not that I don't still sound American. I'll always sound American. But maybe, just maybe, I no longer sound like I'm from Port Huron and there's something in that fact that I find desperately pleasing (key word here is probably desperate).

After visiting the UK and Germany when I was 17 I began to actively change the way I talked. I started to say things like bloody and shite. By the time I was about 18, I realised this made me sound like a poser and an idiot, so I stopped with the Anglophile bullshit, but I did start changing other smaller things in my speech. For example, I stopped saying either with a long E sound and switched to the eye noise instead. I don't know why I liked this better but I did and it's stuck. Sometimes my dad will shout at me for saying EYE-ther, "You're from Michigan! Talk right!" Mostly he's joking.

I've made other, sort of silly changes to my speech as well, like saying a with a sharp a sound instead of the softer a when I want particular empahsis on something, usually for humorous effect, like no it wasn't just any monkey it was A Rhesus Monkey! Hi Yo! Except I rarely do Ed McMahon sound effects, but for digital interpretation I thought it could use a little something extra.

But I do stupid things like that, I'm aware that they're stupid and that it's an almost teenaged affectation on my part but I like it, I like that I put conscious effort into how my sentences sound, I like that I choose my words with care, I like that I'm able to change. As if these small superficial changes are proof that I am capable of greater and deeper change.

And I like that maybe, just maybe I don't sound so small town anymore. I'm not going to put on a faux British accent a la Madonna, I'm not even going to try to throw off the mantle of my Michigan specific Midwestern accent (and she shouldn't either. For shame, Madonna, be proud of you Michigander roots!) but I can't help but be pleased that my accent has evolved a little bit, that maybe, just maybe, it's not quite so nasally as it used to be. And I know it's a stupid and silly thing to care about, but I do, I can't help it. I'l always come from where I come from but I sound like who I've become.